Yahoo – Army National Guard Maj. Shawn Fulker is thousands of miles away serving in Afghanistan, and when his wife’s birthday came around, he decided he wanted to do something very special.

Josephine Fulker loves Mellow Mushroom pizza, so her husband emailed Mellow Mushroom’s corporate website on Thursday to ask whether one of the company’s Jacksonville stores could deliver a pizza and a $50 gift card to his wife at their Jacksonville, Fla., home. If they could, he said, he would call the store and pay for it with his credit card.

Mellow Mushroom did one better. Unbeknownst to Shawn Fulker, a local Mellow Mushroom franchise was working to make his request even more memorable.

“We had the cook make a heart-shaped pizza, and then we stopped by the nearest Publix (supermarket) to get flowers and then we picked up balloons, just to kind of make it special,” Brooke Chafee, a manager at the Jacksonville store, told ABCNews.com on Monday evening.

Chafee and another employee of the store made the special delivery – which included the $50 gift card to Mellow Mushroom – in person to Fulker’s home on Thursday. They didn’t charge Shawn Fulker a thing.

John Valentino, the Mellow Mushroom franchisee who owns that location and others in Jacksonville, said his store was happy to have made the day special for the couple.

“Of course we weren’t going to charge him for anything,” Valentino told ABC. “Him being a serviceman and his wife being home. … Hopefully in her husband’s absence we were able to help her have a great birthday while he’s over in Afghanistan serving our country.”

Josephine Fulker had just finished Skyping with her husband when the doorbell rang and she saw the two Mellow Mushroom employees at her door on Thursday.

“I don’t know their names exactly, but they had a pizza and a big butterfly balloon and a vase of flowers with a gift card for $50 and they told me that it was from my husband. I said ‘Oh my goodness.’ I was surprised and excited and overwhelmed and all of that. It was so nice,” she said.

Here at B-Minus Blogs we love and support our troops to the fullest. They make the ultimate sacrifice and I think many Americans take that for granted everyday. Listen, I’m not the type of guy to hop into the front lines, thats just not me. But we should thank a veteran or armed force member any (and every) time we encounter one on our travels.

I have never seen a “Mellow Mushroom.” It’s somewhat nationwide, and coming from New York, I bet it’s really shitty pizza. I am sorry, but it’s true. Nothing beats NYC Pizza, and yeah it sounds super cliche, but fugg that.

But what this pizzeria lacks in taste, it makes up for it in customer loyalty. They saw that a loyal customer, all the way from Afghanistan…fighting to protect our freedom day in and day out, wanted to do a little something special for his wife.

Ironically, he wasn’t the one going above and beyond the call of duty. Mellow Mushroom not only paid for it, but made a heart-shaped pizza with heart shaped pepperoni and bought flowers, ballons and a 50$ giftcard for her!

You never hear about businesses doing this. This business didn’t care about how much money they were losing by using more ingredients, the extra labor, or paying for the sale. No sir. They rewarded the man (of many) who sacrifices his life for the sake of 300+ million Americans each day.

Hey Mellow Mushroom, if any of us are ever down in Jacksonville, we’ll be sure to stop in a grab a slice! Be sure to follow them @MellowMushroom, and be sure to stop into one of their 20+ locations!

This is what America is all about.

Sidenote – Totally started as a pizzeria for late night munchie fiends…Can’t knock the hustle. Keep on keepin’ on Mellow Mushroom!